Archive by category ''Environment

The ballroom at the Conservative Political Action Conference may be filled with big names and boisterous crowds, but it’s in the small breakout rooms where activists and leaders are plotting how to undo what the Obama administration has done.

Unbeknown to California officials, oil producers in Kern County have been disposing of chemical-laden wastewater in hundreds of unlined trenches in the ground without proper permits, according to an inventory that regional water officials completed this week.

Koda, the 10-year-old male polar bear at the Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium, emerges from a cubbyhole atop the 6,000-square-foot enclosure he shares with 14-year-old Kobe. He steps out to a nearby ledge, his head bobbing and swinging from side to side. He then backs into the cubbyhole, head still...

On a summer day in 1885, three Hawaiian princes surfed at the mouth of the San Lorenzo River on crudely constructed boards made from coastal redwoods, bringing the sport to the North American mainland.

Rajendra Pachauri, who supervised work on the two most detailed studies of climate change ever completed, stepped down as head of the United Nations panel studying the science after allegations he sexually harassed a colleague.

Maria Recio

The shocking find by the buyer of the unit, a woman who asked the Buck estate to allow her to remain anonymous, led the late author’s family to take possession of the find after paying the woman a small finder’s fee. The completed novel, “The Eternal Wonder,” apparently finished just before her 1973 death from cancer, was unknown to her family or to her publishers. | 06/05/13 18:58:44 By - By Maria Recio

It began as an irresistible story: a flea market find in the West Virginia panhandle of a tiny, long-forgotten painting by a French master. Since the announcement last September that the painting, bought in a $7 box of knickknacks, was being put up for auction, a mystery has unfolded with an assortment of characters – a dowager art collector, perplexed museum officials, the insistent buyer and the FBI – and the eventual seizure of the artwork, which turned out to be stolen. Now it’s up to a federal judge to decide who owns the painting, as questions arise over whether there was ever a flea market find at all. | 06/03/13 11:50:39 By - By Maria Recio

The National Endowment for the Arts announced more than $45 million in grants to state and regional arts agencies Wednesday, with funding for all states and an emphasis on arts outreach through schools, libraries and online in programs from Alaska to South Carolina and Texas. | 05/08/13 18:33:17 By - By Maria Recio

The nations front lawn needs sprucing up. The National Mall, the monument-filled, museum-lined, two-mile centerpiece of the capital, envisioned as a Paris-like boulevard, is showing wear and tear. | 05/03/13 17:49:45 By - By Maria Recio

The Incredible Hulk drilling a stone with a jackhammer. Catwoman caring for young children. Spider-Man perched on a skyscraper washing windows. The photographs are of Hispanic Americans at work, dressed by photographer Dulce Pinzon to show everyday Latinos the way their families see them: superheroes working to send money back to their relatives in Latin America. Theyre just a few of the photographs in a new exhibition and book. | 04/29/13 14:38:04 By - By Maria Recio

The White House Correspondents’ Association dinner this weekend has become an annual kind of prom for reporters, politicos and Washington insiders, who get to mingle with big names, starting with the president and first lady, and a lot of glitzy Hollywood stars. | 04/25/13 18:27:01 By - By Maria Recio

The National Endowment for the Arts announced that it was awarding $26.3 million in grants, continuing federal support for the arts despite the automatic 5 percent federal budget cuts that are in force. The agency was able to redirect some unused money from the last grant cycle so that the decrease in federal grants given directly to arts agencies was just 3.2 percent instead of 5. | 04/23/13 18:49:01 By - By Maria Recio

The Boston Marathon bombing story became inescapable, a real-life TV drama unfolding hourly with nonstop coverage on radio, cable television, social media and, in a sign of its power, even on network TV, which pre-empted hours of afternoon programming. Every hour, the story line became more dramatic: a shootout caught on video, a city shut down, a possible terrorist connection to Chechnya, a seemingly failed police search and a dramatic arrest. | 04/19/13 21:30:13 By - By Maria Recio

It was a moment in time that became a moment in history. And now it will be a moment for all time. Van Cliburn's historic winning performance in the 1958 Tchaikovsky International Piano Competition in Moscow has been chosen as one of 25 audio recordings to be added today to the National Recording Registry by Librarian of Congress James Billington. | 03/21/13 15:28:22 By - Maria Recio

Arriving in an imposing black SUV on the plaza in front of the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday morning, an hour ahead of President Barack Obama, who was attending a separate event, the unassuming dissident Cuban blogger Yoani Sanchez created a sensation among politicians, the news media and tourists alike. | 03/19/13 19:32:14 By - By Maria Recio

Used to operating on a shoestring budget, the arts are, nevertheless, bracing for the latest hit as the capitals constellation of federally supported museums, galleries and other cultural institutions grapples with governmentwide budget cuts. | 03/12/13 17:43:28 By - By Maria Recio

The politically charged issue of race was before the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday in a case that could determine how the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act applies to the South. | 02/27/13 18:28:00 By - By Maria Recio

He’s not your usual newbie senator. After just weeks on the job, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, has managed to ruffle feathers on both sides of the aisle with his aggressive questioning of former Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., the Obama administration’s nominee for defense secretary. Some critics said it contained echoes of the McCarthy era. | 02/25/13 17:40:21 By -